Under the Rug
by Dr. Fluffmuffin
Summary: A simple question reminds Lloyd and the others that years of torment can't just be swept under the rug.


**I own nothing but the story.**

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His father tended to yell when he got emotional. Whether he knew it or not, Garmadon would speak louder every time his emotions would get the better of him, as if he were attempting to hide whatever feelings lay beneath the surface.

Lloyd hadn't seen his father do it in a long time. Ever since the Devourer's venom had been purged from his veins, Garmadon was normally a soft-spoken man, only raising his voice so that his students could hear him when he taught.

Now he was nearly as loud as he'd been back when he was evil, when he was always angry or hiding something that hurt him. And Lloyd didn't know what to do.

It all started with a simple question:

"Did you have any nicknames when you were younger?"

The question came from Cole, who sat at the corner of the Bounty's couch, curled up around a notebook with his pencil in hand. This earned a few arched eyebrows from several of the ninja, as well as the man in question.

"I'm sorry?" Garmadon asked, a confused smile twitching at the corners of his lips.

"A nickname?" Cole pressed, "From your childhood. Did you have any?"

Lloyd turned his gaze towards his father, curiosity itching within him.

Garmadon seemed hesitant at first, but kept a friendly face, "Might I ask why you need to know this?"

Cole answered with a one shouldered shrug, "I kind of need to know," when the rest of the ninja continued to stare at him, he swallowed and elaborated, "I wanted to write a song with all your names in it, but nothing rhymes with 'Garmadon'."

Jay snorted and Zane smiled. Lloyd frowned as he tried to think of a word that would work for his father's admittedly bizarre name.

Garmadon responded with a chuckle, "Well, gee, I can't think of anything right off the top of my head."

"Pizza Face!"

The ninja snapped their heads towards the voice that had spoken. Sensei Wu stood in the doorway of the living area, sipping tea and refusing to hide the twinkle in his eyes.

"Remember, brother?" he said, "It was shortly after you started puberty; your face got all oily and broke out in spots practically overnight! I called you Pizza Face because it was spotted like pepperoni."

This earned a laugh from everyone in the room, and Lloyd was relieved to see that Garmadon was included in this.

"Yes," the old man chuckled, "I do remember that. If I recall, I stopped you from doing it after about a week."

Jay busted out a laugh, "It took you a week to get him to stop?"

Garmadon's face turned serious for a moment, "Well, that was during a time in my life where Father was trying to teach me patience and anger management through meditation. Don't think it worked."

A few giggles sounded, and Lloyd felt one escape him as well.

Cole's pencil hovered over the page, "Is...that all?"

Garmadon shook his head and shrugged, "That's the only real nickname I ever had, unless you count Monster, of course."

Everyone froze. For a second, they could only stare at the man in the center of the living area, who sat smiling and oblivious to the sudden change in atmosphere. Lloyd cast his eyes over to Sensei, and felt a slice of fear slide up his spine when he saw that the Sensei's eyes had fallen to the floor, having gone completely dark.

After a moment, he spoke up, "You were called...Monster?"

Garmadon nodded easily, "Oh yeah, of course."

Lloyd blinked in surprise. "But—how?" he asked, "Sensei said you only looked like...er... you did after you fell to the Underworld."

Garmadon turned to face him and gave him a frown, "Do you not know what I used to look like before I fell?"

Lloyd, as well as the rest of the ninja, shook their heads. Sensei remained silent and still.

"Well," Garmadon stood up and began to pace, "You could say I looked a lot like you, except taller, darker, and far more handsome."

He said this with a smile, which Lloyd found difficult to return. How could his father be so okay with talking about this?

"Yes indeed, I would have been the most handsome man in the village," Garmadon continued, rubbing his hands together, "had it not been for a few... _other_ characteristics," he paused at the far end of the room, taking a moment to stare out of the small window, "The Devourer's venom did many strange and terrible things to me," he said, beginning to pace again, "Including altering my appearance," he clutched his right arm and pulled at the sleeve, his smile disappearing fast, "My skin," he said, "It was pale. It was paler than any I ever knew. It was so pale," he gestured vaguely in Zane's direction, "His suit is colorful by comparison."

Lloyd swallowed as Garmadon began to pace a little bit faster.

"That alone was enough to get people to recoil at the sight of me," Garmadon shook his head and stared at the ceiling, "People are cruel, you know? I've known snakes that were kinder. I remember, I developed this habit of scratching," as he said this, he began to dig his fingernails into his skin and rake them up and down, "I would scratch and scratch at my arms, my face, my breastbone. You know why I'd scratch?"

He thrust his arm into Lloyd's face, showing off the raw skin.

"Look!" he said, "See the color?" he drew his arm away and went back to pacing, volume louder than before, "But that didn't help. If anything, it was detrimental. People would see me scratch and look away, hide their face from my hard stare. I suppose this contributed to my nickname, but it wasn't the worst of it."

Garmadon was getting steadily louder, and Lloyd turned towards his teammates for help, but their eyes were on his father, transfixed by his story. Lloyd then tried for Sensei, but their teacher continued to stare at the floorboards. This was when Lloyd noticed the hand holding Sensei's tea was shaking.

"The worst part," Garmadon said, all traces of his former good mood gone, "Was my eyes. They were terrible; they glowed, Lloyd, they glowed scarlet. They were a marker of what I was, a sign showing the world that I wasn't a man, but a shell, an egg, housing an evil that would destroy all of Ninjago," Garmadon was speaking faster, moving faster, beginning to yell, "And they couldn't have that, no! Our village was housing a monster, someone who could murder them in their beds whilst they slept! I remember they would say to me, 'How many children have you killed today, Monster? Drink the blood of any livestock, recently?' It was horrible, nightmarish, even today I can feel the humiliation!"

Garmadon suddenly stopped. Heaving, he turned to face his brother, who hadn't moved from his spot in the doorway. After a moment, Sensei Wu raised his eyes to meet his brother's, which shone bright with unshed tears.

"I suppose," Garmadon spoke again, tone dropping to a whisper, "I got my revenge on the villagers. On everyone."

A knife could have cut through the tension in the room. Nobody moved. The only sounds were the winds that ripped past the Bounty as it sailed across the sky.

Finally, Garmadon laughed, but it was bitter, and he laughed alone, "Guess you could say the nickname fits. Especially now that I've fallen."

A sudden rustle drew everyone but Garmadon's eyes towards Cole. He had closed the notebook and rested it on his knees. A second later, Wu spoke:

"If you'll excuse me, uh, I'm going to go meditate for thirty minutes."

With that, he darted out of the area. It wasn't long before Garmadon followed, moving past the room his brother had disappeared into.

The ninja were silent as the tension leveled out. Then, one by one, they left the room, each of them giving Lloyd apologetic glances as they exited. Cole looked downright guilty, but Lloyd didn't blame him. After all, it was he who pressed further, who wondered why. Guilt tore through him as he thought about what it must have been like for his father, to have spent most of his life being hated and hateful, only to be set free in his golden years. He couldn't imagine.

Shaking his head, Lloyd stood up and headed towards the room the ninja shared. On his way, he passed a window that overlooked the Bounty's deck, where he spotted his father standing out by the railing. Freezing, Lloyd stared.

Garmadon had his back to the cabin; he stood at the very edge of the railing, his hands resting on his hips and his eyes towards the sky. He didn't look sad, Lloyd noticed, but rather confused. For a moment, Lloyd considered going out to his father, walking up next to him and standing there. What would he say?

As Lloyd watched, Garmadon took one hand and began to scratch at his forearm, back and forth, back and forth. Lloyd looked away. What would he say? What could he say? A simple victory against an evil overlord couldn't erase all the years of torment rained upon both Ninjago and the tormentor himself. Lloyd felt his own tears springing to his eyes, and tried blinking them away. He just didn't know what to do, and by the looks of it, neither did Sensei Wu.

He looked back out at his father. He'd stopped scratching now, and had returned his hands to their original position. Even at a distance, Lloyd could see the marks left on his father's arm. Releasing a sigh, Lloyd turned away and left his father staring at the empty blue sky.

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 **Thank you for reading!**


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